Exclusive Interview with Bennett Packaging

Smithers Pira recently had the opportunity to speak with Garrett Bradley, Vice President and Scott Anderson, Barberan Jet Master Lead at Bennett Packaging.

Smithers Pira: What first attracted you to investing in digital?

Bennett Packaging: We’re very familiar with digital printers, as we’ve had digital printing capabilities for several years. It’s always been a convenient option only for prototyping and samples. It was when one of our digital printers quit operating efficiently in 2015, that we took a deeper dive into investigating new digital options. In true Bennett fashion, we researched the top of the line technology, and discovered Barberan’s Jetmaster. The fact that we could get the quality expected by our clients, yet at production speeds, all from a digital press was eye-opening.

Smithers Pira: What have you learned along the way and is there anything you would do differently?

Bennett Packaging: As you can imagine, the installation and then running a digital press of this caliber is very delicate, so there was a lot to be learned. A lot of testing and trials took place the first few months after installation to insure that once we launched our new capability to the marketplace, we’d hit the ground running. The only thing I think we’d do differently is to start the educational process with our clients earlier. We are finding that the perception of digital printing solutions being only for short-runs, or that digital print is not high-quality, is a sticky one.

Smithers Pira: How do you educate your customer base about the potential of digital?

Bennett Packaging: Seeing is believing. The best way to educate our customer base has been through video, plant tours and providing samples of their current artwork. The video and plant tours shows how fast this machine can run, and how it can change the art in-line without a shut down. The samples prove the quality of the print—how it is comparable to litho.

Smithers Pira: What would be on your wish list from the digital technology providers?

Bennett Packaging: Our primary wish would be to have more ink vendors to partner with. Not being limited to a single ink supplier was one reason we chose a Barberan Jetmaster, however, there still are not a lot of options. As we know from basic economics, competition drives down costs, and reducing digital ink prices, would help break down the digital printing barriers.

Smithers Pira: What are you most looking forward to about the conference?

Bennett Packaging: I’m looking forward to hearing from other leaders in this field speak to their area of expertise. We are looking forward to hearing the vision of digital and how their customer-base is reacting to this new technology from others in this rapidly growing field.

Hear more from Scott during his case study presentation on Corrugated Applications: 2016 packagePRINTING Excellence Award for Welch’s Sparkling Project as part of the Digital Print in Action: Converter Case Studies session at Digital Print for Packaging US.